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The Government will provide a $1 million sponsorship to the Hong Kong Council of Social Service (HKCSS) for organising an IT training project to improve the IT literacy and capability of small and medium social enterprises.
Announcing the sponsorship at the NGO Day 2009 this morning (June 11), the Government Chief Information Officer, Mr Jeremy Godfrey, said it was the third sector-specific project under the IT Training Programme for SMEs.
Mr Godfrey said, "We launched the IT Training Programme for SMEs last year to enhance the IT capability of the individual workforce and the industry sectors concerned. Two training projects for SMEs in the travel industry and Chinese medicine practitioners have already commenced earlier this year."
He said there were more than 250 social enterprises with more than 1,000 entrepreneurs and practitioners and 5,000 frontline employees in Hong Kong. These enterprises needed support in various areas such as operations, business strategies, branding, positioning, marketing and management.
"Information technology is definitely one of the important areas that can help the social enterprises improve their daily operations and increase competitive advantages."
The IT training project for social enterprises, which will run from October 2009 to May 2010, aims to enhance the operational efficiency and competence of practitioners in the enterprises through a series of tailored training courses. Classes on commercial and general IT applications will be organised for frontline staff to improve their IT literacy and capability.
The project is expected to benefit about 340 practitioners in social enterprises and create job opportunities for the IT industry in the areas of project management, training materials development and class conducting.
Mr Godfrey also told the participants of the NGO Day 2009 that the Government had earmarked $63 million to conduct a one-year education programme to teach Internet users, especially students of primary and junior secondary schools, how to use the Internet appropriately and safely. The campaign will cover a wide range of issues such as respect for personal data privacy and intellectual property rights, avoidance of Internet addiction, and protection against virus attack. Under the programme, a series of school-based activities, district-level activities and thematic services would be conducted in August 2009 to October 2010.
As regards another initiative of setting up an elderly portal to provide one-stop information on elderly services and the silver hair market, Mr Godfrey said that the Government would soon kick-off an Expression of Interest exercise to openly invite proposals from interested organisations providing elderly-related services.
"We hope that through this portal and various computer courses offered by the Elder Academies, the elderly will enhance their computer knowledge and their ability to use digital services, expanding their circles of life through the Internet," he said.
Ends/Thursday, June 11, 2009
Issued at HKT 16:09
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